Metascore
74 out of 100

Mixed or average reviews - based on 25 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 15 out of 25
  2. Negative: 1 out of 25
  1. Showing Sims at work gives us more simple but enjoyable ways to play, though it still needs help from our imaginations. [July 2010, p.92]
  2. In comparison with other add-ons, Ambitions is really well made and integrates real gameplay treats for you. The only missing thing about The Sims is the multiplayer, so please, EA, think about it.
  3. The new expansion of The Sims makes us work. To achieve the ambitions of our Sims as firefighter, tattooist, ghost hunter among the others is fortunately always gratifying, as being able to finally follow the Sims while their working. A must-have integration for all the fans of the series.
  4. The second addon for famous The Sims 3 brings you new career choices for your virtual family - among them jobs as firefighter, ghosthunter or stylist. Sounds cool but the fun of playing the job routines day by day vanishes too quickly. The Sims 3 Ambitions is solid but nothing more.
  5. This professional ambitions are delicious and far above what we expect from an expansion. With this simple addition, we are left with a revitalized game, where many hours of fun are expected.
  6. Having expanded the concept of behavioral freedom beyond all expectations, Ambitions proves to be an excellent addition to the universe of The Sims 3. The new careers, along with the possibility to manage them freely, will surely manage to engage and entertain any fan of the series.
  7. 80
    The new profession system will doubtless keep Sims 3 fans busy for many more hours, and the other additions included will also give players plenty of new stories to tell for Sims both new and old.
  8. The Sims 3's latest expansion isn't entirely ambitious, but it's loaded with great new content and goofball charm.
  9. In short, The Sims 3 Ambitions is a fine specimen of a Sims expansion that introduces fresh, fan-requested gameplay options to the core game, as well as many smaller tweaks that make the game more fun as a whole.
  10. The best job of all may be to cound the daily revenue for The Sims 3 at EA, but this add-on probably comes quite close. Even though it's a bit more of the same, it's hard to escape the typical Sims charm.
  11. Ambitions is overall a good add-on but lacks some more content to make it really worth the money.
  12. Ambitions is good add-on that fortunately adds some new gameplay elements. It's actually fun to play the jobs, although the firefighter and the ghostbuster jobs consist basically of simple mouse-clicking. A bit more extent would have been good.
  13. The Sims 3: Ambitions is an add-on that actually adds something. It changes the way the game plays and adds six different occupations which are great fun, but can be a bit hard to combine with a large virtual family.
  14. The Sims 3 : Ambitions clearly peers at the Adventure genre, in an apparent attempt at pepping up its gameplay. A new direction that we already felt with World Adventures, the first expansion pack. As it was the case with this previous one, it's the opening of a new side of the title that makes this expansion interesting. The impact those new experiences have in the long run on the personal stories of the avatars help forgetting the immediacy they may seem to have at first glance. For the first time, our Sims live real and distinctive lives and their interactions have influence over their neighbors' lives.
  15. I'm not sure there is enough content here to appease all but the most diehard Sims fans. After what I thought was a pretty good add-on in World Adventures, this second Sims 3 expansion just feels uninspired and lacking.
  16. Players who prefer to control a single character will happily dive deep into the whirlpool of daily grind. The rest will face a classic dilemma: stellar career or domestic bliss.
  17. With The Sims 3: Ambitions fans will finally get the change of getting a job with their Sim and actually go to the 'office' with them. A more than welcome add-on for the franchise, even though the job sometimes gets a little too easy.
  18. New add-on comes with less adventure or interesting ideas then the previous expansion of World Adventures, but it is a nice and pleasant game experience anyhow. [Issue#192]
  19. Ambitions delivers plenty of content and new features to The Sims 3, and is well worth a look despite some boring and repetitive new tasks.
  20. The Sims 3: Ambitions adds just a little more depth to gameplay and fans should find enough here to keep them playing until the next expansion pack comes out.
  21. The idea is excellent, but overall a weaker expansion than the first and not as exciting. [July 2010, p.98]
  22. The new professions are a fun idea but there aren't enough of them to justify the high asking price.
  23. This expansion will fit players who always dreamed to play with their Sims while those are at work, but it could have gone a bit further.
  24. A money sucking expansion whore. [Oct 2010, p.88]
  25. Boring and uninteresting job mechanics make this Sims-expansion a disappointment. Anyone but the most die-hard Sims-fans should get their fix elsewhere.
User Score

Mixed or average reviews- based on 21 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 4 out of 4
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 4
  3. Negative: 0 out of 4
  1. The sims 3 ambitions is amazing!You can now have professions such as firefighting,architectural design,stylist,investigating,inventing,sculpting,and I don't remember anything else.So Sim On!!!! Full Review »
  2. Showing Sims at work gives us more simple but enjoyable ways to play, though it still needs help from our imaginations. But I think that World of Adventiores, Pets, and Late night are better! Full Review »
  3. The Sims 3: Ambitions is the second Sims 3 expansion pack, and introduces interactive jobs, as well as more options for the non-interactive jobs, and laundry! There are basically five new jobs, firefighter, home designers (interior and exterior)/hair sylists/tatoo artists (all designers of sorts), detectives, self-employed (inventors) and ghostbusters. The medical career has also been revamped, but is still a rabbit hole job, you can just engage in out of the office jobs now, like vaccinations. These are okay, they can get fairly repetitive, as a firefighter, considering there are only so many houses in a town, you'll eventually begin noticing that "Hey, haven't I saved this house three times already?" and contrary to what I expected, there isn't any challenge to the firefighter job, I guess this could be a good thing, since the Sims isn't supposed to be a mission-based type of game, but it seems stupid when your Sim can just stand in the fire and casually use his fire extinguisher to put out fire surrounding him. Also, no longer do firefighters use those stupid pickup trucks they did in the base game (not a huge issue, but it looks a lot better seeing them in actual firetrucks). You'll also be staying in the fire station waiting for a fire to happen (which happens oddly often), you can also experience earthquakes, which will cause a massive ****storm of accidents to occur all at once. Then there's home designers, you basically just wait for someone to call you saying they need you to redesign their house, which you're given a list of requirements and must do the best you can on a budget, so if you're one of those people who just buys the Sims to build houses, you may have a reason to stop motherloding and get a job. There's also hair stylists, fashion designers and tattoo artists, where someone needs a new look, and you can either do it for them, or be evil and make them hideous. Detective is interesting, you're called (or you can visit the cop shop to get a case) and don't seem to have a time limit (Maybe there is one, but I've never run out of time, even when keeping a case over a few days), and just need to go "talk to Jim Robins", "Search through Roberta Williams garbage can" etc. in order to put a case together and eventually (your sim will) solve it. They're super predictable and there's only about 5 cases including in Ambitions, so once you've done about 5 cases, you'll start doing the same cases over and over and over again. The Detective career is interesting, but considering the limited amount of cases in the game, it gets really boring repetitive in a short amount of time. Honestly, I've never tried self-employed, but it seems as if you must develop your inventing skill, then apply to be self employed (I believe you can also be an artist) at city hall, you then just sit at a desk "inventing" and sell your inventions. The more skilled you are, the more cash you'll bring in. Finally there's ghostbusters, which you'll be called and told "There's ghosts in my house" and you must go suck them up in a vacuum where you can then sell them at the science lab. There's also some new buy objects (including a new car and many new appliances, surfaces, decor items and more) and some new build objects. One big edition, which is probably my favourite part of the expansion, is laundry. It's totally optional if you don't like the sound of it. You can now create a laundromat for your town and go there to pay and do laundry, or you can actually buy machines at home (or a clothesline, if your Sim is eco-friendly, a new trait that makes your Sim vomit if they use eco-murderous appliances or items) where your Sims will start dropping clothes sometimes when they change (you can buy hampers to keep your house clean, which of course get full) and then do laundry, which gives your Sim a very long lasting happy moodley (your sim is happier for a while). Is The Sims 3: Ambitions worth it, let it be noted that in the Town Life expansion, there is laundry, and that one only costs $20, rather than $30, so if you don't like jobs and just motherlode like the cheater you are, then you probably will not enjoy this expansion, if you do get jobs for your Sims and are upset by the lack of interaction, you will probably enjoy this expansion. Full Review »